


Lost And Found

by RussianWitch



Category: James Bond (Craig movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, Animal Transformation, BAMF Q, Don't copy to another site, M/M, Other, Slow Build, не копировать
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-27
Updated: 2019-01-27
Packaged: 2019-10-17 21:20:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,812
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17568125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RussianWitch/pseuds/RussianWitch
Summary: James Bond dies during a mission.Except Q's equipment says otherwise, but why would an agent hide out in a cat cafe?





	Lost And Found

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Cailecz](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cailecz/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Cat!Bond](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17490866) by [Cailecz](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cailecz/pseuds/Cailecz). 



> Due to RL biting me quite spectacularly in the ass, I'm posting the first chapter of the story for the reverse bang (as agreed to with the mods). The rest will follow ASAP.
> 
> The artwork the story is based on was done by the talented Cailecz

Bond leans against the wall next to Q’s door a bottle of vodka in his hands.

Bond is there to discuss additional modifications to the car Q restored for him, and possibly to argue ownership again. Alcohol doesn't fit into the scenario Q has planned out for the evening, neither does Bond's body pressing him into the one empty spot of wall between the door and the coat rack nor his lips on Q's throat and jaw overconfident and questioning at the same time.

Sinistra twines between them in greeting chirping at the familiar visitor, distracting Bond into bending down to pet her leaving Q gasping for breath and wondering what the hell he's doing with his life.

"Let's move this somewhere with fewer distractions, shall we?" Bond murmurs, bracing a hand on Q's hip to push himself up like he needs the assist, too close and unreal, too much of everything.

There are a few rules Q has in life, to keep things running smoothly, and not sleeping with colleagues had been one of them.

Had been, because once he was assigned to the 00's, to Bond . . .

It's a friendship of sorts that they have, Q reminds himself wrinkling Bond's tie horribly by wrapping it around his hand to pull the other man along upstairs to the bedroom, built on trust more than affection, on convenience if Q's honest with himself.

In the bedroom, they undress side by side, not helping and trying not to hinder in the crowded little room. Q's things go in the laundry basket and the closet, Bond's on the chair Q's specifically brought in for that purpose sometime before.

Only when they are both naked, does Bond reach out, pull Q into his arms again mouthing at the back of his neck while his hands roam Q's front. Gentle hands that leave no trace of their explorations on Q's skin.

Sometimes he wants to ask for bruises, scratches, marks of any kind to remind himself he hasn't imagined the whole thing when he wakes up alone and goes to work to not see Bond for days and weeks at a stretch between field missions.

Sometimes he wonders what would happen if he asked Bond to stay.

He doesn’t.

What they have is enough, he tells himself, more than he would have otherwise busy as he is with his job. His last boyfriend is a distant enough memory that it no longer comes with the bitter taste of failure. His last date ended 12 hours before he had to equip Bond for the first time with awkward excuses and insincere promises on Q's part.

If only he could keep Bond from becoming a habit.

Turning around, he bites at Bond's mouth, takes control and presses the other man down onto the bed. Bond lets it happen, opens himself up to Q's mouth and hands, tangles his hands in Q's hair to keep him from pulling away.

What they do is a far cry from the bedroom athletics Q is occasionally witness to on mission. Not that they couldn't, they just never seem to get around to that sort of thing and quite satisfied with the simplicity of touch and taste. The rock themselves to completion against each other, cock sliding along cock, making a mess of their bellies and the sheets, lying there after tangled together in a heap listening to the cats' attempts to force the door.

All of it a matter of convenience.

#########################################

Bond dies in a fiery explosion, taking with him most of a drug factor located in a former chemical lab in Arnhem, The Netherlands.

It is not an unexpected death, all told, for an agent of his rank if unexpected on what was considered an easy mission.

Q watches via satellite, and a suspiciously murky scryer's display as the building 007 had entered not long before is torn apart by pressure and heat.

The chance of 007 having survived, is judged minimal long before the last of the flames is doused.

The last things Q hears from Bond is another round of gentle mocking of his cardigans and an invitation to lunch at some new and exotic café once Bond gets back to London.

The next three weeks are a blur of reports, recriminations and sleepless nights wondering if there had been anything, _anything,_ Q, or his subordinates could have missed that had cost the agent his life.

When he had been promoted, Q knew sooner or later an agent under his care would be lost, he’d been prepared for it and yet to lose _that particular agent_.

If it weren’t for the bureaucratic distractions, he wouldn’t have dealt with the failure particularly well.

Six weeks after Bond’s death, Eve corners him as he is getting ready to start his day.

"I can guess why you're here," he says glaring at her.

"Good, then you'll be a good boy, pack up your bag and toddle off home?" She says with a sunny smile that should make her seem non-threatening but only serves to make Q's hackles rise.

"I'm not a child! You can't just send me to my room without supper!" He snaps turning away to grab some papers at random to stuff violently into the nearest filing cabinet.

"Q," she relents instantly, dropping the secretary persona, "it's standard procedure. You should have been given leave right after debrief _along with_ an appointment to a counsellor."

"I'm fine!" He insists gripping the edges of the cabinet tight.

"I…" she starts, then changes her mind mid-sentence, "when was the last time you slept a full night?"

"I don't see what that has to do with anything!" Ignoring that every time he closes his eyes, the explosion blooms behind his eyelids, over and over again.

"I didn't sleep for weeks after shooting Bond, months really, despite being trained to…" she trails off. "I may not know how you're feeling but…"

"What if someone more powerful could have cut through the fog?" He blurts, "what if he's dead because _I_ was promoted over someone more…"

His lack of magical ability had closed a lot of roads to him. For all his smarts, barely being able to do a glamour or a personal shield was seen as suspect, a personal failing or possibly a moral one, a defect in an individual no matter how one looked at it. That MI6 had been willing to hire him despite it, had been a miracle. That he'd been promoted; unprecedented, and possibly erroneous.

"If a team of nine scryers couldn't break through working together, one more magically powerful individual wouldn't have made a difference. Focus on all the times you _were_ crucial to saving agents because of who you are!"

If it had been any other agent, her words might have made a difference.

"Am I supposed to see a councillor?" He changes the subject.

"You can make an appointment once you get back from your holiday. One week off. Security has orders not to let you in sooner than that. You have to give yourself time to…"

"I'll sign the damn paperwork if you don't finish that sentence," Q snaps ignoring the pity in her eyes. She even does him the courtesy of not staying to supervise as he gathers his belongings.

Seven days at home with nothing to do is a daunting prospect one Q refuses to face without a project to pass the time. He looks through the filing cabinets at the various small personal projects which ended up there one time or another abandoned due to lack of time or interest. He picks out two of them which easily fit in his bag and are fiddly enough that seven days should pass quickly when a half-buried tablet catches his eyes.

He hasn't seen that particular tablet since the SPECTRE situation has brought to a close. Along with the Smartblood nanites, he'd been testing a new interface on the tablet that allowed it to charge from nearby electrical sources wirelessly.

On impulse, he turns it on.

On a map of Europe that should be empty, a single dot blinks indicating the location of an active nanites carrier.

##################################

It starts with the car.

The modifications were making it impossible for Bond to just pick a garage and have it serviced without the constabulary being called in. Not that Q would allow it, feeling quite proprietary about the automobile having rebuilt it practically from scratch.

After Bond comes back from his impromptu holiday with a deep tan but without the woman, he brings the car in for a checkup, cheerfully donning overalls to root around the engine right along with Q and even asking some intelligent questions about the new electronics when no one is listening. Maintenance turns into a discussion of different types of modifications Q branch could add to the fleet of duty cars both on British soil and abroad.

They end up huddled around Q's laptop arguing about computerising the self-defence capabilities of a car over take out cartons as the labs around them are abandoned in the end of day rush. During a passionate defence old style, mechanical armaments Bond's hand slides high up Q's thigh, and he does nothing to change its location.

They don't make it into the house after Bond drives him home, jerking each other off parked in the sleepy street awkwardly reaching over the gearshift and handbrake to get at each other.

###############################

The trip home seems to take ages, the tube horribly congested for the middle of the day making it impossible to take out the tablet to _look._ It feels like everyone is watching him, possibly even reading his mind as loud as he’s thinking stray thoughts must be leaking past his mental shields.

Concentrating on breathing exercises calms him down enough to stop acting conspicuously by the time he gets off at his station. Strolling home takes all of his dramatic skills, just in case M has decided to get a couple of HR scryers on his case, or worse psyche department ones.

Sighing with relief when he feels his house wards close around him, Q pulls out the tablet terrified that he's hallucinated the dot due to lack of sleep.

The Smartblood had been a brilliant invention, the pinnacle of nano-technology progress without so much as an ounce of magic involved. An ethically suspect one as the committee reviewing it had pointed out before scrapping the whole project, but a brilliant one nonetheless.

Q had almost forgotten about it, with everything else calling for his attention—had in fact forgotten to disable both tablet and the nanites as only Bond had ever been injected with it, so the nanites had kept on sending and the tablet kept on tracking.

Had, in fact, kept tracking 007’s movement _after_ his death.

[Location: Amsterdam, Amsterdam-West, Marco Polo Street 211]


End file.
